


I'm Hardly Together (I Gladly Surrender)

by dressedupasmyself



Series: 30 Days of Klaroline (June 2020) [11]
Category: The Originals (TV), The Vampire Diaries (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Medical, Caroline works too hard, F/M, Friends With Benefits, Klaus just wants to cuddle, Midnight heart to heart, Pining
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-13
Updated: 2020-06-13
Packaged: 2021-03-03 19:48:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,059
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24701077
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dressedupasmyself/pseuds/dressedupasmyself
Summary: “None of this is making any sense to me,” Caroline grumbled. Klaus wrapped a hand around the back of her neck and squeezed lightly.“That’s because you’re sleep-deprived, love. A few hours of rest will do you a world of good.”“I’m fine.”Klaus indulged her for a few moments more, rubbing his thumbs along the tight line of her shoulders and pressing his lips to the top of her head
Relationships: Caroline Forbes/Klaus Mikaelson
Series: 30 Days of Klaroline (June 2020) [11]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1770547
Comments: 12
Kudos: 88





	I'm Hardly Together (I Gladly Surrender)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [recyclings](https://archiveofourown.org/users/recyclings/gifts).



> Title taken from the song "Your Bed" by All Time Low (yes I know, I can't keep taking my titles from their songs, whatever, just let me live Urika okay? XD).
> 
> Also, this is for recyclings, because they asked for pining and friends with benefits and I aim to please (sometimes) (I mostly just please myself).

When Klaus woke up, it was still dark outside his bedroom. He squinted at the clock on the bedside table and inwardly groaned at the sheer ungodliness of the hour.

He spotted the cause of his untimely awakening. Caroline was sat at his desk, the glow from her laptop leaving her as an undoubtedly beautiful, if exhausted, silhouette.

“Why am I alone in this bed, love?” He rubbed a hand over his face.

Caroline glanced at him for only a moment, obviously engrossed in whatever she was busy with.

Klaus wasn’t surprised at this behaviour. He’d worked with Caroline at the clinic for two years now, and had been occasionally accommodating her in his bed for a little over three months. There was an intensity about her that always drew him in, and if that meant dealing with her nightly habits, he was willing to compromise.

That in itself was saying something, since Klaus did not compromise when his way was usually so much better than anyone else’s.

“We need to push some funds around,” Caroline said, and he could just make out her anxiety-riddled frown, “if we want to maintain any kind of grounds with the IRS.”

“As right as you are,” Klaus drawled, “I don’t see why that needs to happen at three-thirty in the morning.”

Caroline said nothing, nimble fingers reaching out to type a few lines. She paused, seemed to read it, then erased it with a frustrated huff.

Mentally cursing what he was about to do, he peeled back the covers and stood. The hardwood floors were cold under his bare feet, and the crisp air of the early morning against his sleep-warmed skin made him shiver. He shuffled over to his closet to grab a hoodie for him, and a thick jersey for Caroline when he noticed that she was dressed only in his button-up from the night before.

They’d attended one of the nearby hospitals’ fundraisers, hoping to smooth talk some investors into dropping a grand or two into their nonprofit’s lap. Klaus thought it had gone well – Caroline had a lot of pull with some of the rich older gentlemen, and Klaus was not above flirting with their wives to wrangle them into taking out their chequebooks.

Of course, a night like that did not come without its frustrations, and he and Caroline had wordlessly gotten into the same cab at the end of the night to relieve their combined tensions.

Caroline’s fingers wrapped distractedly around the jersey he dropped in her lap, and when he let his hand rest on her shoulder, she was cold to the touch.

“You’re freezing, sweetheart, put on the jersey.”

Barely looking away from the screen, Caroline did as he asked. He reached out to release her hair from where it had caught in the neckline, and when his knuckles trailed over her neck, she leaned into his touch.

“None of this is making any sense to me,” Caroline grumbled. Klaus wrapped a hand around the back of her neck and squeezed lightly.

“That’s because you’re sleep-deprived, love. A few hours of rest will do you a world of good.”

“I’m fine.”

Klaus indulged her for a few moments more, rubbing his thumbs along the tight line of her shoulders and pressing his lips to the top of her head.

When she yawned wide enough to risk swallowing the entire computer, Klaus decided he’d had enough. He reached over to swat her fingers away from the keyboard, closing the laptop with his other hand. When she started to protest, he swirled her chair around to face him and dropped down to his knees in front of her.

He laid his arms on either side of her legs, effectively pinning her between his chest and the chair. He reached up to turn on the table lamp so he could see her properly.

He liked the look of her in his clothing. It stirred something possessive inside him that had been buried under deep-rooted commitment issues and his career for a number of years. It also soothed the ire he’d felt at the greedy way the men at the fundraiser had watched her the entire night.

“Caroline,” he said, not a trace of amusement in his voice, “You look like death warmed over. You need to sleep. These problems will still be there in the morning.”

Her head tilted with the indignant way she looked at him. “Exactly. These problems can’t still be there in the morning, we have people depending on us. They don’t have the luxury to _let things go_ when they’re roaming the streets with tuberculosis and no health insurance, so neither can I.”

Klaus rested his forehead against her knees, trying to think of the right words to say.

He had to get it right the first time, or he knew that Caroline would disregard everything else he tried to convince her of. She was stubborn as the dawn of time, and with a heart the size of Russia, nearly unstoppable when it came to her work. He admired that about her, this fire inside her that matched his own.

But he was tired and she was running on Red Bull and nicotine, if the empty cans and cigarette packets were anything to go by, and there was nothing he’d rather do than crawl under his 500-thread-count sheets and allow the rise and fall of Caroline’s chest to lull him back to sleep.

“Sweetheart,” he started, raising his head. “We spent three hours in exquisite boredom for this very reason. On Monday, when all those stuck-up investors are back in office, I will personally call every single one who promised so much as a penny to us, and I will not back off until I see the numbers in our back account. Do you trust that I’ll keep my word on that?”

Caroline’s resolve softened reluctantly. “Yes, but – “

He stopped her with a pinch of his fingers against her hips. “You, Caroline, are the most incredible human being I have ever met. Everything you touch, everything you so much as _look_ at, is infinitely better off because of it. That includes me, love, and I’m quite difficult to improve upon, if I have to admit it myself.”

The way Caroline’s eyebrow rose informed him of exactly what she thought of his overdeveloped ego, and his lips quirked just slightly in amusement at the familiarity of the action.

“I mean it. You have this way of making people believe that they are worth being cared for, worth saving, no matter what mistakes they’ve made or how terribly they’ve acted. You make people see the worth in _themselves_ , and that is a difficult thing to do in a time when humanity is brainwashed into viewing their own existence as inferior, and where the act of sacrificing yourself for the sake of others is glorified.”

Caroline avoided his gaze, and he knew that he was on the right track. “Yeah, well, I just don’t think any human life should be treated as expendable.”

“And your own?”

He asked the question quietly, and he felt Caroline tense in his arms. She didn’t react for a long moment, and he let the silence linger so she was forced to consider what he’d said.

“Look at me, Caroline.”

She did, eyes wary on his.

“You’re going to burn out if you don’t allow yourself to rest.” He swallowed, unsure if he should continue the thought. He did anyway. “Let me care for you, sweetheart.”

Her eyes widened, head shaking minutely. “Don’t go there.”

And Klaus wanted to. Oh, did he want to, after pretending to be fine with watching Caroline walk away from him time and time again. After feeling her slip from his grasp just when he’d gotten a taste of what it would be like if she let him have her _properly_ , in every sense of the word, and not just in this pathetic friends-with-benefits agreement that left him with a woman-shaped chasm in his bed and in his heart and in his life whenever she left.

“Too late,” he said, and he was suddenly intensely aware of how vulnerable he was, on his knees and half naked and ready to beg. He couldn’t find it in himself to care. “Tell me, Caroline, what have I done to give you reason to doubt me?”

Her breath hitched, and Klaus greedily took in every flicker of emotion she showed him. If this was going to be the last moments he got with her like this, open and nestled into his space like she belonged there, he was sure as shit going to make certain he savoured it.

“It’s not – you know why I don’t want to go further with you –“

“Yes, love, I know, my reputation precedes me,” he snapped. “I am well aware of the stories that go around, and I cannot deny that I’ve found it hard to commit to women in the past, but people aren’t _rigid_ _things_. Have I not made it clear how much I’m willing to sacrifice to have you look at me with just a fraction of the affection I feel for you?”

He watched her eyelids flutter, lips parting as she tried to make sense of the sudden shift in their conversation. He let her, waiting in another uncharacteristic show of patience.

Then she gripped tightly at the front of his jacket, expression turning stony. “I don’t entertain infidelity. Either I’m your first, and only choice, or you walk. I don’t have time to be hurt.”

Klaus felt the starting flames of hope lick at his veins, and his smile was just a little unsure. He wouldn’t be able to tolerate the pain that would accompany a misunderstanding in that moment.

“Be clear in your intentions, Caroline. Be very certain. You’re not the only one in danger of being hurt.”

Her face softened, grip loosening against his chest. She slid her hand up his collarbone and along the back of his neck until it got lost in the mess of his hair. He wanted so badly to give in, close his eyes and _purr_ at her touch, but he needed to know. He needed to make sure.

“You’re right. You haven’t given me any reasons to doubt you in the last few months, and if I cling to the notion of rumours on a grapevine, regardless of the truth behind them, then I’d be a hypocrite.” She leaned forward until her nose just barely brushed his, and it was uncomfortable to keep looking at her eyes from this close, but he couldn’t bear it if he had to look away just then. “And I’d be lying if I said I don’t want you.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.” She leaned back just a bit so she could watch him with a calculating expression. “If we do this, we both need to be all in.”

“ _Sweetheart_ ,” he breathed, “You have my clothes and my soul and my undivided attention. I’d be delighted to let you rob me dry for the chance to keep you.”

She searched his eyes for a moment longer, then sighed. She leaned over the desk, and for a single terrifying second Klaus thought she was going to open her laptop and tell him to bugger off, but instead she flipped the switch on the light.

“Fine. Take care of me, Klaus.”

And he intended to, with every fibre of his being. He didn’t waste any time in carrying her to where he’d wanted her the entire night, and she sighed in contentment when her head hit the mountain of pillows he’d only bought because he knew that she liked to sleep like she was a fragile thing cradled in packing peanuts.

She went pliant and lazy when he kissed her, and he kept the movement of his lips slow, allowing it to feel like a lullaby, an ending and a beginning wrapped into one joyful bundle.

It didn’t take long for her eyes to drift shut, and he gently moved a strand of hair out of her face. He watched her or a long while, unable to believe that she’d trusted him with this much of her.

But, he reckoned, it was only fair, since there wasn’t a single element of his existence that wasn’t somehow tied to Caroline Forbes.


End file.
